CAPACITY TO ABSORB IMMIGRANTS.

Evening Post, Volume CVII, Issue 53, 6 March 1929, Page 11

CAPACITY TO ABSORB IMMIGRANTS.

Both Australia and New Zealand have relatively high rates of natural increase, and as they have high standards of living their capacity to absorb immigration will bo restricted, unless there is a decline "in'tho standard of living. This possibility m;iy be ruled out of consideration/ for neither country will reducoits standard for the purpose of absorbing immigrants. Before the war with rising prices and the expansion of the dairying and meat industries the absorption capacity of both countries was high, but theso conditions do not operate to-day. Australia has been able by her increasing. tariff and'her special marketing schemes to continue her rate of growth despite the recourse to inferior lands. Now Zealand has found it necessary to intensify her cultivation of existing, lands, but in neither'case, has there been an ora.of prosperity oqual to that of the ten years before, the war. If this be true the increase in. population must be permanently lower than the pre-war rate, and with the natural increase'fixed at, say 1.2 per cent, there would be a margin of. not. more than .5 per cent, per'annum on the average for immigration. At this rate the populations would grow at 1$ per cent, per annum and this would still be t a hjgh rate of increase for countries wjith high living" standards.. Immigration would therefore be fixed for the next decade at about 35,000 per annum for Australia and 5000 for New Zealand. Thero might be variation's from year to year, but this average figure would be the approximate absorption capacity. This estimate is based upon' the . essential condition that there is no lowering of the standard of Jiving. SIZE OF POPULATION IN RELATION TO GROWTH. The above estimates of rates of natural, increase and immigration are hased upon experience over a long period. The figures for a few years cannot be taken as a guide. Thus in both Australia, and New Zealand the above estimates were exceeded for the period "1923-27, the average animal im-migration-being 42,000 and 8600 respectively for the two countries. But; both were forced to reduce their numbers in 1928, and the lower rate persists. •■■This rise and fall iv immigration is the normal condition. As the Commonwealth' Statistician remarkedin a recent discussion of the subject, "like the boa constrictor, we ■ are in the habit of bolting our immigrants and then resting until, we have digested them." A period of very active immigration eventually gives way to one of comparative inactivity. It is easy to argue that if restrictions wer/3 swept asirle the numbers of immigrants would S/'pidly increase. But it may well be risked: "What type of immigrants?" In Australia there would bo a greater vumber'of Southern Europeans arriving and their presence in large, numbers concentrated in a few areas would ruise awkward social and political problems." In addition, their living . standards are low and they would be objected to on this account. The assumption that restrictions should be swept away is -indeed out of the question, for

it raises the old problem of tho standard of living. Germany could make largo reparation payments if she would reduce her standard of living, but in spite of repeated pressure over tho last decade there is no chance of her croditors forcing such a policy upon her. Nor is there any possibility of increasing immigration by a similar policy in Australia and Now Zealand. In both countries the population is increasing rapidly". With Canada they occupy a leading position among tlio nations of tho world in this respect, and it is the rate of increase not the absolute figures to which attention should bo directed. A small population can increase' at a certain rate per cent., just as can a large population, but this reduces the absolute increase. ■ This is the usual law of growth, and it is v misunderstanding of its relation to the growth of populations that has led to extravagant ideas upon tho numbers of immigrants 1 Australia and New Zealand can absorb. ■ ■■■